Foucauldian Power Capillaries and Cuckery to Weaponized Slave Morality: a Call to Polity
We all know the cowering rightist when we see him. Ask him about politics, and, if he's not trying to change the subject, he'll inevitably say something akin to "both parties are a fraud." Corner him on his views, and you'll reveal he believes in some mix of conservative, libertarian, and/or nationalist positions on laws and public policy. But then, why won't he simply say who and what he supports? Why is nearly every statement affirming his rightist positions qualified with some eye-rolling iteration of "I don't like either [insert rightist politician] or [insert leftist politician], but... [insert meekly articulated rightist position in careful dialectic]"? Because, he knows the social consequences of wrong-think and is hedging his bets accordingly.
Welcome to the world of Foucauldian power capillaries, a phrase associated with Michel Foucault, a leftist 20th century French philosopher and communism espouser associated with poststructuralism and/or postmodernism: the belief that epistemology (i.e. inquiry into the nature of truth) is a rouse to justify power. By "power," Foucault primarily meant the control of human behavior by others. And what we call knowledge is really just control over human belief. There is no underlying objective "truth," but, instead, competing forces within a culture using the illusion of truth as a bludgeon to assert dominance.
Despite coming from France, a more centralized state authority compared to those in other European nations, Foucault believed power within societies flowed like capillaries in the human body (e.g., his book Power/Knowledge, p. 96) [*1]. Power is the aggregate of complex social interactions of people and communities. It's not just, or even primarily, the threat of jail that controls our behavior regarding laws or social customs we might disagree with. Control of us stems from fear of social ostracism from our peers. Is it really a few nights in jail that keeps us from committing an illegal act (one we believe erroneously so), or is it the stigma of a criminal record that does?
According to MRI studies after Foucault's passing in 1984, social ostracism causes reactions in our brain parallel to physical pain [*2]. Views successfully challenging our world view (i.e. cognitive dissonance) also cause measurable discomfort, detectable in the leftist's larger anterior cingulate cortex of his brain relative to the conservative [*3], inferably causing relatively stronger sensations of discomfort, which independently correlate with him being three times more likely to remove the conservative from his social media circle [*4], likely to relieve that discomfort. The leftist gets more annoyed with people who disagree with him and projects his suffering onto his opponents using public shame as his bludgeon (e.g., social media outrage mobs like that against Justine Sacco and Prof. James Watson, causing him to sell his Nobel prize, awarded for co-discovering DNA, after his academic assassination) [*5] [*6] to assert dominance and regain the illusion of control he has over his own emotions.
To the postmodernist, attacks (be they direct or indirect, conscious or unconscious) toward a group of people are seen more as a justification to build the identity of the attackers up more than to criticize or change the attacked. For example, calling someone "gay," (perhaps in the '90s more than now) to the postmodernist, is seen more as glorifying your own masculinity than shaming the subject of your pejorative into change.
While we likely all have different underlying natures of life motivations (e.g., some to God, family, or maximizing pleasure, others to power over others), we can identify one's underlying nature by what he claims is the underlying nature of all. While we can't empirically prove humanity's underlying nature is control over others as the postmodern leftist believes, we know that must at least be true for him, since he asserts it. Among rightists I discuss foundational principles with, the thought of gaining any sense of pleasure or meaning out of power over others is sickeningly antithetical to our core beings. Thus, in practice, this notion by the postmodern leftist must be psychological projection. If they can pretend we are using the illusion of truth as a bludgeon to assert dominance, it justifies them doing the same to us.
Such shaming used to be far more subtle. In the 1960s and '70s, during Foucault's prime, conservative forces had more power within society relative to today. The left would relentlessly critique traditional or "bourgeois" values in our culture, using academia, media, and entertainment industries, but it eventually became the very monster it purported us to be. American social science academia used to be 3.5:1 Democrat to Republican in 1970 but climbed to 8:1 by 2004 and 11.5:1 in 2016 [*7]. Compared to 1994, the average Democrat is 60% more liberal (the Republican, 8% more conservative) [*8]. For over 50 years, relentlessly criticizing any perceived power structures with values antithetical to communism and socially shaming conservatives out of public affirmations of the positions they hold, in lieu of dialectic, has been academically in vogue. Such ankle-biting criticism is akin to what Friedrich Nietzsche called "slave morality," the notion that those with power aren't morally righteous enough to deserve what they have and just deserts will be served in the afterlife (i.e. the meek shall inherit the Earth).
The modern iteration isn't about waiting for the afterlife but about seizing power in the here-and-now [*9]. If people with power are guilted enough, surrender may come out of pity, at first, but, later, out of fear of social ostracism that may turn financial (e.g, firing and/or losing clients or sales). Preying on empathy is a profitable industry (e.g., Jesse Jackson shaking down companies who fail to hire enough members from his tribe) [*10]. Leftists have co-opted "slave morality" as a weapon, shaming their opposition into submission. The more cultural power leftists have, the more weight is given to their bludgeon of social ostracism.
The idea that political power doesn't stem from successful campaigns but from culture is a somewhat clichéd adage, popularized by the late Andrew Breitbart, but known for thousands of years. It was understood not just by postmodern espousers of communism like Foucault, but those of classical antiquity, like Plato espousing state control of the arts to ensure passions wouldn't be swayed against a communist aristocracy he once advocated for in the Republic. And leftists have dominated three of our primary cultural institutions, academia, the news media, and the entertainment industry, for nearly a century.
In American academia, 18% of social science professors identify as Marxists and only 5% as conservatives [*11]. In 42% of humanities departments, there are more leftist third-party registrants (e.g., the Working Families Party and Greens) than Republicans [*12]. Imagine the impact this has on students. At Michigan University, 21% of students reported discrimination based on their political views [*13].
Humanities faculties will further grow in leftist allegiance. Over one-third of social psychology professors in the Netherlands admitted they'd discriminate in hiring against an equally qualified conservative candidate [*14]. And we see that hiring practice in action with American professors aged 35 or younger registering as Democrats 22.7:1, with assistant professors at 19.3:1, associates at 13:1, full-time at 11.7:1, and emeritus (essentially retired) at 8.6:1. The data clearly shows the monopoly on thought is primed to accelerate to even more absurd ratios.
Studies affirming leftist bias in news media bias are replete, but the growing rabidity of it is fascinating to observe. A Harvard study of the first 100 days of Trump's presidency found the tone of coverage (i.e. how a story is framed) 80% negative compared to only 41% negative for the same period for Obama [*15] (no surprise, since 60% of journalism departments have zero Republican faculty) [*16]. You can't open Google on your phone without it recommending a Washington Post hit-piece against a member of the right or (usually) Trump guised as journalism, no matter how measurably pro-Trump you might be in Google's algorithmic spying of your habits.
And our narrative entertainment industries hammer the culture with anti-capitalist and anti-Christian messages ad nauseam, as I've gone into great detail about in a prior posting [*17]. Perhaps most amusing was the media's programming of the masses to vote for Hillary Clinton in 2016 by coincidentally airing shows featuring women in pantsuits in authority. Not exactly subtle, no wonder it failed.
Yet, despite academia, news media, and our entertainment inundating us with messages extolling their political virtues, why does the right have any semblance of political power, let alone a currently increasing one, in America and the European nations?
We're used to hearing phrases like "the silent majority" or "the forgotten man" to describe our reticent stands against the left's "march of progress" against our values (e.g., that men, and especially those pretending to be women, can and should be banned from a women's restroom). Yet, even if we on the right do practically represent the will of the voters, as empirically detectable through the processes set up by our classically liberal republics throughout the West, it certainly doesn't feel that way when you listen to family describe school, watch a program or movie, or notice an advertisement. Shouldn't the "silent majority" have more power to advance its values both within the political community and mass culture, as opposed to merely slowing the left's inevitable advances (i.e. Democrats being 60% more liberal compared to 1994) [*18]?
We generally reject the Foucauldian view that truth is an illusion used to assert power. Truth may be elusive, but it is ultimately detectable through measuring events in empirical reality (e.g., compare communism's 85-100 million political dissidents starved and executed for wrong-think compared to lives in classically liberal republics) [*19]. Alas, Foucault had a point about how power controls us with its decentralized or capillary nature.
People are afraid to voice rightist viewpoints, because thousands of professors, journalists, and Hollywood entertainers silence us into submission as larger veins of power capillaries dispersing shame through their fans echoing their sentiments with underemployed free time, targeting individuals for disemployment and/or depersoning. As social media shaming mobs make examples out of anyone on the right who wrong-thinks, who wants to be branded with Google's scarlet letter of shame via multiple hit-pieces about you popping up in search results for anyone to view who might look you up in the future? Who wants to explain that to a prospective employer? In James O'Keefe's book, American Pravda, he notes a soldier's answer to his question about the difficulty of facing bullets versus facing a bureaucrat who might fire you: "A firefight lasts for minutes. The decisions you make, you make in seconds. And you know someone's always got your back. But in government, it takes years to build up a reputation and a ton of moral courage to put it on the line. Plus, you've got lots of time to stew about that decision, too much time [*20]."
Men looking to broaden their romantic opportunities are especially susceptible to this social pressure, as younger unmarried women they'd want to date tend to be far more to the left [*21]. The spotlight of social ostracism of being on the right might diminish a man's dating prospects. As such, a social media hate-mob might not be able to lynch you, but it could contribute to your gene death. And if a man is married, who wants to risk a hate-mob disemploying and depersoning him when he has a family and/or wife to support?
The left's capillaries of power have a carrot angle to them as well. In America, any Republican or conservative that speaks out against President Trump is praised by our media. Look to the recent passing of Republican Senator John McCain, one of Trump's most hysterical critics. Did McCain hold such views out of principles? Probably not, since he advertised strongly in favor of putting a fence on the Arizona-Mexico border while later demonizing Trump over his support for that very issue.
Was McCain merely indulging in the praise the media were feeding his ego? Do songs of media praise, pumping through the capillaries of mass culture, control narcissistic unprincipled Republicans like a pied piper? Google lights up your phone with not mere praise for the man but shame toward anyone who might dare be insufficiently obsequious to his legacy. And all he had to do to go from being the media's enemy #1 in 2008 to being anointed St. McCain was bend the knee to the hysterical forces against Trump (the man pushing for the very ideas he purportedly got into politics to implement).
My inferred position, thus far, might be to resist both the pain of social ostracism and the temptation of useful-idiot praise. To, instead, speak out regardless. And some on the right deserve shame for cowardice or duplicity; sometimes the label "cuck" for the sin of betraying your foundational principles is quite apt. We can respect the British soldier who fought in the Revolutionary War and forgive his killing of American ancestors, but Benedict Arnold was another story all together. Yet some on our side who refuse to speak out for legitimate reasons (e.g., protecting your job or income stream by hiding or denying your real political views) do not deserve an Arnold-level of contempt. And we all have different roles to play with different times to play those roles.
Our solution is not as simple as having courage to speak out. For example, I read a blog post from Vox Day a while back referencing a comment by a second amendment supporter in a jury pool on a criminal gun possession case. The pool was asked by the judge what the right that is the foundation of all other rights is. The man proudly yelled, "The Second Amendment!" After discussion between the judge and both parties, the entire pool was dismissed. Had the man kept quiet and stayed on the pool, he could have swayed or hung the jury and saved a man possibly being unconstitutionally prosecuted.
This feeds into a trait, both positive and negative, about the American political right, showcasing a critical fissure on our side. Our virtues are contextualized by 19th century European, especially Lockean, classical liberalism, prioritizing the values of the individual over the community (i.e. libertarianism). This value can conflict with nationalism or your obligations to your community, but is usually resolved by an understanding that laws should not control individual behavior on moral virtue but be checked by non-legal social pressures, guiding us toward practicing moral excellence toward our neighbors.
This Lockean individualism, further developed by modern American libertarian scholars like Murray Rothbard and Robert Nozick, may guide us to reject identifying with a community and, instead, prioritizing our individual autonomy. If a Republican agrees 90% with an individualist/libertarian on the right, the temptation is for that individualist to deny association with the Republican. Sometimes he'll equally denounce the Democrat (who disagrees with him nearly 100%) and the Republican (who disagrees with him 10%) as if they were equally detestable. Of course, no two people agree 100% on every possible issue. And without cooperation and coordination among fellow rightists, what political or cultural action could we possibly accomplish?
The modern political right is a community with values grounded in liberty (freedom from as opposed to a right to) but also in a respect for nation and tradition. It's okay to have a little diversity in opinion; a dialectic amongst the right is healthy. Albeit some on the modern right are grounded in utilitarian ethics of the classical liberals like Jeremy Bentham and John Stuart Mill, most (and especially American) are grounded deontologically (i.e. foundationally) in natural rights via modern philosophers like the late Robert Nozick, enlightenment ones like John Locke, and Thomas Aquinas of the middle ages. But we all have one foundational political philosopher we should appreciate. Aristotle.
Classical antiquity was a time of great experimentation of political communities. Just about any system we can think of today was tried in some form or another; be it aristocracy or monarchy (rule by the master(s)of reason), timarchy (rule by honor class/military), oligarchy (rule by the wealthy), or various forms of democracy (forms akin to civic republicanism as well as direct democracy) and just about everything in between (regimes didn't last as long back then). Aristotle defended property rights, the nuclear family, and local control (he abhorred empires as impractical and dangerous). His views were the foundation for Western civilization (i.e. small jurisdictions of political power as opposed to large empires, private property, and a mother and father raising children together via marriage). But he didn't channel his perspective of individual rights being an end in themselves but an end to make a prosperous polity (i.e. an organized political society). And articulating views on politics was a duty one had to his polity, a virtue one would practice to develop to achieve a more aggregate sense of moral excellence and, thus, eudaimonia (happiness and human flourishing).
It isn't enough to ruggedly stand strong and speak out against the left, perhaps recklessly sacrificing yourself to the social justice hate-mob. The right needs to come together as a community to support one another. Some are in positions to withstand the social justice hate mobs. If so, like myself, then make a habit of speaking out a few times a week on different issues: to your friends, family, social media, etc. If you can afford to speak (i.e. immune to hate mobs), it is immoral (i.e. cuckish) not to. With Google (YouTube), Facebook, and Twitter illegally using their monopoly powers to restrain public discourse from the rightwing news outlets [*22] you have a duty to your community to speak out or donate your time to walk neighborhoods for your local candidates to help foster a prosperous future for your progeny.
What if you legitimately can't speak? If you have disposable income (and most of us have frivolous expenses we can cut out of our lives), don't blow your budget on the directly political realm (i.e. donating to candidates). Support literature on the right from publishers like Castalia House and Arkhaven. Donate to legal rights groups on our side (e.g., Pacific Legal Foundation, Institute for Justice, and Judicial Watch) and undercover journalists like Project Veritas, exposing government and media corruption. Get books from or donate to various right-wing thinkers challenging the left's academic strangle-hold on political philosophy. The individualist might scoff at donating his hard-earned money to someone else who is doing indirect work but think nothing of wasting money with a company antithetical to our values on a trite frivolity (e.g., a $5 cup of coffee at Starbucks). Put your philosophy on spending in the right context.
The key to overcoming oppressive Foucauldian power capillaries is not merely to resist their flow, but to build our polity of resistance. The left's foundational beliefs are some iteration of communism (be it democratic or dictatorial, when property rights are not foundational but a state privilege, they don't exist), which has always been a global goal (be it communism via Plato's aspirations for a global empire or Marx's workers' party as a purported destiny of global control). Thus, power capillaries have large nodes that are increasingly global in scope (e.g., Google's monopoly on information flow and the European Union's transnational property controls). Since we don't believe in globalism but, nationalism, how do we resist large power structures?
Respect for the political sovereignty of nations doesn't mean we can't build our own international polity to support one another. For example, we want Sweden to have independent sovereign control, but those within Sweden who resist the consolidation to a global socialist empire are our brothers and sisters in the counter-revolution. There is a global polity of the right, one respecting the individual nations along with their sovereignty, and we should let each other know of our support for one another.
After reading this, ask yourself. What will you do? Aristotle taught us that virtue is not an act but a habit. What changes will you make to your life on a day-to-day or week-to-week basis that will assist in our political and cultural aims toward human flourishing?
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[*1] https://monoskop.org/images/5/5d/Foucault_Michel_Power_Knowledge_Selected_Interviews_and_Other_Writings_1972-1977.pdf
[*2] "Heightened activity in the dorsal ACC [anterior cingulate cortex of the brain] was found when participants were either implicitly or explicitly excluded, relative to the inclusion condition. These researchers also found increased activation in the right ventral prefrontal cortex [of the brain], a site associated with negative affect regulation, during explicit (though not implicit) [social] exclusion. Eisenberger et al. (2003) described these reactions to social exclusion as 'a pattern of activations very similar to those found in studies of physical pain' (p. 291)."At Page 210. http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/download?doi=10.1.1.335.4272&rep=rep1&type=pdf
[*3]https://www.researchgate.net/publication/268800545_Cognitive_dissonance_induction_in_everyday_life_An_fMRI_study
[*4] http://thehill.com/homenews/311047-poll-dems-more-likely-to-unfriend-people-due-to-political-posts Further, "57% of those who identify as Republicans say a lot of their close friends are also Republicans, while another 21% say some of them are. An even larger share of Democrats (67%) say a lot of their close friends are Democrats; an additional 18% say some of their close friends are members of their own party. By contrast, far fewer partisans say they have friends in the opposing party. About four-in-ten Republicans (39%) say they have a lot or some friends who are Democrats; most Republicans (55%) say just a few or none of their friends are Democrats. Even fewer Democrats (31%) have at least some friends who are Republicans. About two-thirds of Democrats (64%) have just a few or no Republican friends." http://www.people-press.org/2017/10/05/8-partisan-animosity-personal-politics-views-of-trump/
[*5] https://www.forbes.com/sites/tarunwadhwa/2013/12/23/justine-sacco-internet-justice-and-the-dangers-of-a-righteous-mob/#38a4882a66ab
[*6] http://human-stupidity.com/equality4/race-equality4/james-watson-ruined-for-telling-truth-about-race-sells-nobel-prize-medal
[*7] https://econjwatch.org/file_download/944/LangbertQuainKleinSept2016.pdf?mimetype=pdf
[*8] Credit to Kevin Ryan of Unbiased America for analysis as well. http://www.people-press.org/2017/10/05/the-partisan-divide-on-political-values-grows-even-wider/
[*9] Commentary by Stephen Hicks: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KbA9ALOrHaA
[*10] https://www.wnd.com/2002/03/13093/
[*11] https://www.academia.org/self-identifying-marxist-professors-outnumber-conservatives-as-college-professors/
[*12] https://econjwatch.org/file_download/944/LangbertQuainKleinSept2016.pdf?mimetype=pdf
[*13] http://freebeacon.com/culture/study-political-orientation-most-common-cause-of-discrimination-at-u-of-michigan/
[*14] https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2012/aug/1/liberal-majority-on-campus-yes-were-biased/
[*15] https://shorensteincenter.org/news-coverage-donald-trumps-first-100-days/
[*16] https://econjwatch.org/file_download/944/LangbertQuainKleinSept2016.pdf?mimetype=pdf
[*17] http://stratagemsoftheright.blogspot.com/2017/05/hollywood-narrative-entertainment.html
[*18] Credit to Kevin Ryan of Unbiased America for analysis as well. http://www.people-press.org/2017/10/05/the-partisan-divide-on-political-values-grows-even-wider/
[*19] https://infogalactic.com/info/Mass_killings_under_Communist_regimes
[*20] James O'Keefe. American Pravda. (2018). Page 205.
[*21] http://www.people-press.org/2015/04/07/a-deep-dive-into-party-affiliation/
[*22] http://stratagemsoftheright.blogspot.com/2017/08/the-ire-and-corruption-of-social.html
Welcome to the world of Foucauldian power capillaries, a phrase associated with Michel Foucault, a leftist 20th century French philosopher and communism espouser associated with poststructuralism and/or postmodernism: the belief that epistemology (i.e. inquiry into the nature of truth) is a rouse to justify power. By "power," Foucault primarily meant the control of human behavior by others. And what we call knowledge is really just control over human belief. There is no underlying objective "truth," but, instead, competing forces within a culture using the illusion of truth as a bludgeon to assert dominance.
Despite coming from France, a more centralized state authority compared to those in other European nations, Foucault believed power within societies flowed like capillaries in the human body (e.g., his book Power/Knowledge, p. 96) [*1]. Power is the aggregate of complex social interactions of people and communities. It's not just, or even primarily, the threat of jail that controls our behavior regarding laws or social customs we might disagree with. Control of us stems from fear of social ostracism from our peers. Is it really a few nights in jail that keeps us from committing an illegal act (one we believe erroneously so), or is it the stigma of a criminal record that does?
According to MRI studies after Foucault's passing in 1984, social ostracism causes reactions in our brain parallel to physical pain [*2]. Views successfully challenging our world view (i.e. cognitive dissonance) also cause measurable discomfort, detectable in the leftist's larger anterior cingulate cortex of his brain relative to the conservative [*3], inferably causing relatively stronger sensations of discomfort, which independently correlate with him being three times more likely to remove the conservative from his social media circle [*4], likely to relieve that discomfort. The leftist gets more annoyed with people who disagree with him and projects his suffering onto his opponents using public shame as his bludgeon (e.g., social media outrage mobs like that against Justine Sacco and Prof. James Watson, causing him to sell his Nobel prize, awarded for co-discovering DNA, after his academic assassination) [*5] [*6] to assert dominance and regain the illusion of control he has over his own emotions.
To the postmodernist, attacks (be they direct or indirect, conscious or unconscious) toward a group of people are seen more as a justification to build the identity of the attackers up more than to criticize or change the attacked. For example, calling someone "gay," (perhaps in the '90s more than now) to the postmodernist, is seen more as glorifying your own masculinity than shaming the subject of your pejorative into change.
While we likely all have different underlying natures of life motivations (e.g., some to God, family, or maximizing pleasure, others to power over others), we can identify one's underlying nature by what he claims is the underlying nature of all. While we can't empirically prove humanity's underlying nature is control over others as the postmodern leftist believes, we know that must at least be true for him, since he asserts it. Among rightists I discuss foundational principles with, the thought of gaining any sense of pleasure or meaning out of power over others is sickeningly antithetical to our core beings. Thus, in practice, this notion by the postmodern leftist must be psychological projection. If they can pretend we are using the illusion of truth as a bludgeon to assert dominance, it justifies them doing the same to us.
Such shaming used to be far more subtle. In the 1960s and '70s, during Foucault's prime, conservative forces had more power within society relative to today. The left would relentlessly critique traditional or "bourgeois" values in our culture, using academia, media, and entertainment industries, but it eventually became the very monster it purported us to be. American social science academia used to be 3.5:1 Democrat to Republican in 1970 but climbed to 8:1 by 2004 and 11.5:1 in 2016 [*7]. Compared to 1994, the average Democrat is 60% more liberal (the Republican, 8% more conservative) [*8]. For over 50 years, relentlessly criticizing any perceived power structures with values antithetical to communism and socially shaming conservatives out of public affirmations of the positions they hold, in lieu of dialectic, has been academically in vogue. Such ankle-biting criticism is akin to what Friedrich Nietzsche called "slave morality," the notion that those with power aren't morally righteous enough to deserve what they have and just deserts will be served in the afterlife (i.e. the meek shall inherit the Earth).
The modern iteration isn't about waiting for the afterlife but about seizing power in the here-and-now [*9]. If people with power are guilted enough, surrender may come out of pity, at first, but, later, out of fear of social ostracism that may turn financial (e.g, firing and/or losing clients or sales). Preying on empathy is a profitable industry (e.g., Jesse Jackson shaking down companies who fail to hire enough members from his tribe) [*10]. Leftists have co-opted "slave morality" as a weapon, shaming their opposition into submission. The more cultural power leftists have, the more weight is given to their bludgeon of social ostracism.
The idea that political power doesn't stem from successful campaigns but from culture is a somewhat clichéd adage, popularized by the late Andrew Breitbart, but known for thousands of years. It was understood not just by postmodern espousers of communism like Foucault, but those of classical antiquity, like Plato espousing state control of the arts to ensure passions wouldn't be swayed against a communist aristocracy he once advocated for in the Republic. And leftists have dominated three of our primary cultural institutions, academia, the news media, and the entertainment industry, for nearly a century.
In American academia, 18% of social science professors identify as Marxists and only 5% as conservatives [*11]. In 42% of humanities departments, there are more leftist third-party registrants (e.g., the Working Families Party and Greens) than Republicans [*12]. Imagine the impact this has on students. At Michigan University, 21% of students reported discrimination based on their political views [*13].
Humanities faculties will further grow in leftist allegiance. Over one-third of social psychology professors in the Netherlands admitted they'd discriminate in hiring against an equally qualified conservative candidate [*14]. And we see that hiring practice in action with American professors aged 35 or younger registering as Democrats 22.7:1, with assistant professors at 19.3:1, associates at 13:1, full-time at 11.7:1, and emeritus (essentially retired) at 8.6:1. The data clearly shows the monopoly on thought is primed to accelerate to even more absurd ratios.
Studies affirming leftist bias in news media bias are replete, but the growing rabidity of it is fascinating to observe. A Harvard study of the first 100 days of Trump's presidency found the tone of coverage (i.e. how a story is framed) 80% negative compared to only 41% negative for the same period for Obama [*15] (no surprise, since 60% of journalism departments have zero Republican faculty) [*16]. You can't open Google on your phone without it recommending a Washington Post hit-piece against a member of the right or (usually) Trump guised as journalism, no matter how measurably pro-Trump you might be in Google's algorithmic spying of your habits.
And our narrative entertainment industries hammer the culture with anti-capitalist and anti-Christian messages ad nauseam, as I've gone into great detail about in a prior posting [*17]. Perhaps most amusing was the media's programming of the masses to vote for Hillary Clinton in 2016 by coincidentally airing shows featuring women in pantsuits in authority. Not exactly subtle, no wonder it failed.
Yet, despite academia, news media, and our entertainment inundating us with messages extolling their political virtues, why does the right have any semblance of political power, let alone a currently increasing one, in America and the European nations?
We're used to hearing phrases like "the silent majority" or "the forgotten man" to describe our reticent stands against the left's "march of progress" against our values (e.g., that men, and especially those pretending to be women, can and should be banned from a women's restroom). Yet, even if we on the right do practically represent the will of the voters, as empirically detectable through the processes set up by our classically liberal republics throughout the West, it certainly doesn't feel that way when you listen to family describe school, watch a program or movie, or notice an advertisement. Shouldn't the "silent majority" have more power to advance its values both within the political community and mass culture, as opposed to merely slowing the left's inevitable advances (i.e. Democrats being 60% more liberal compared to 1994) [*18]?
We generally reject the Foucauldian view that truth is an illusion used to assert power. Truth may be elusive, but it is ultimately detectable through measuring events in empirical reality (e.g., compare communism's 85-100 million political dissidents starved and executed for wrong-think compared to lives in classically liberal republics) [*19]. Alas, Foucault had a point about how power controls us with its decentralized or capillary nature.
People are afraid to voice rightist viewpoints, because thousands of professors, journalists, and Hollywood entertainers silence us into submission as larger veins of power capillaries dispersing shame through their fans echoing their sentiments with underemployed free time, targeting individuals for disemployment and/or depersoning. As social media shaming mobs make examples out of anyone on the right who wrong-thinks, who wants to be branded with Google's scarlet letter of shame via multiple hit-pieces about you popping up in search results for anyone to view who might look you up in the future? Who wants to explain that to a prospective employer? In James O'Keefe's book, American Pravda, he notes a soldier's answer to his question about the difficulty of facing bullets versus facing a bureaucrat who might fire you: "A firefight lasts for minutes. The decisions you make, you make in seconds. And you know someone's always got your back. But in government, it takes years to build up a reputation and a ton of moral courage to put it on the line. Plus, you've got lots of time to stew about that decision, too much time [*20]."
Men looking to broaden their romantic opportunities are especially susceptible to this social pressure, as younger unmarried women they'd want to date tend to be far more to the left [*21]. The spotlight of social ostracism of being on the right might diminish a man's dating prospects. As such, a social media hate-mob might not be able to lynch you, but it could contribute to your gene death. And if a man is married, who wants to risk a hate-mob disemploying and depersoning him when he has a family and/or wife to support?
The left's capillaries of power have a carrot angle to them as well. In America, any Republican or conservative that speaks out against President Trump is praised by our media. Look to the recent passing of Republican Senator John McCain, one of Trump's most hysterical critics. Did McCain hold such views out of principles? Probably not, since he advertised strongly in favor of putting a fence on the Arizona-Mexico border while later demonizing Trump over his support for that very issue.
Was McCain merely indulging in the praise the media were feeding his ego? Do songs of media praise, pumping through the capillaries of mass culture, control narcissistic unprincipled Republicans like a pied piper? Google lights up your phone with not mere praise for the man but shame toward anyone who might dare be insufficiently obsequious to his legacy. And all he had to do to go from being the media's enemy #1 in 2008 to being anointed St. McCain was bend the knee to the hysterical forces against Trump (the man pushing for the very ideas he purportedly got into politics to implement).
My inferred position, thus far, might be to resist both the pain of social ostracism and the temptation of useful-idiot praise. To, instead, speak out regardless. And some on the right deserve shame for cowardice or duplicity; sometimes the label "cuck" for the sin of betraying your foundational principles is quite apt. We can respect the British soldier who fought in the Revolutionary War and forgive his killing of American ancestors, but Benedict Arnold was another story all together. Yet some on our side who refuse to speak out for legitimate reasons (e.g., protecting your job or income stream by hiding or denying your real political views) do not deserve an Arnold-level of contempt. And we all have different roles to play with different times to play those roles.
Our solution is not as simple as having courage to speak out. For example, I read a blog post from Vox Day a while back referencing a comment by a second amendment supporter in a jury pool on a criminal gun possession case. The pool was asked by the judge what the right that is the foundation of all other rights is. The man proudly yelled, "The Second Amendment!" After discussion between the judge and both parties, the entire pool was dismissed. Had the man kept quiet and stayed on the pool, he could have swayed or hung the jury and saved a man possibly being unconstitutionally prosecuted.
This feeds into a trait, both positive and negative, about the American political right, showcasing a critical fissure on our side. Our virtues are contextualized by 19th century European, especially Lockean, classical liberalism, prioritizing the values of the individual over the community (i.e. libertarianism). This value can conflict with nationalism or your obligations to your community, but is usually resolved by an understanding that laws should not control individual behavior on moral virtue but be checked by non-legal social pressures, guiding us toward practicing moral excellence toward our neighbors.
This Lockean individualism, further developed by modern American libertarian scholars like Murray Rothbard and Robert Nozick, may guide us to reject identifying with a community and, instead, prioritizing our individual autonomy. If a Republican agrees 90% with an individualist/libertarian on the right, the temptation is for that individualist to deny association with the Republican. Sometimes he'll equally denounce the Democrat (who disagrees with him nearly 100%) and the Republican (who disagrees with him 10%) as if they were equally detestable. Of course, no two people agree 100% on every possible issue. And without cooperation and coordination among fellow rightists, what political or cultural action could we possibly accomplish?
The modern political right is a community with values grounded in liberty (freedom from as opposed to a right to) but also in a respect for nation and tradition. It's okay to have a little diversity in opinion; a dialectic amongst the right is healthy. Albeit some on the modern right are grounded in utilitarian ethics of the classical liberals like Jeremy Bentham and John Stuart Mill, most (and especially American) are grounded deontologically (i.e. foundationally) in natural rights via modern philosophers like the late Robert Nozick, enlightenment ones like John Locke, and Thomas Aquinas of the middle ages. But we all have one foundational political philosopher we should appreciate. Aristotle.
Classical antiquity was a time of great experimentation of political communities. Just about any system we can think of today was tried in some form or another; be it aristocracy or monarchy (rule by the master(s)of reason), timarchy (rule by honor class/military), oligarchy (rule by the wealthy), or various forms of democracy (forms akin to civic republicanism as well as direct democracy) and just about everything in between (regimes didn't last as long back then). Aristotle defended property rights, the nuclear family, and local control (he abhorred empires as impractical and dangerous). His views were the foundation for Western civilization (i.e. small jurisdictions of political power as opposed to large empires, private property, and a mother and father raising children together via marriage). But he didn't channel his perspective of individual rights being an end in themselves but an end to make a prosperous polity (i.e. an organized political society). And articulating views on politics was a duty one had to his polity, a virtue one would practice to develop to achieve a more aggregate sense of moral excellence and, thus, eudaimonia (happiness and human flourishing).
It isn't enough to ruggedly stand strong and speak out against the left, perhaps recklessly sacrificing yourself to the social justice hate-mob. The right needs to come together as a community to support one another. Some are in positions to withstand the social justice hate mobs. If so, like myself, then make a habit of speaking out a few times a week on different issues: to your friends, family, social media, etc. If you can afford to speak (i.e. immune to hate mobs), it is immoral (i.e. cuckish) not to. With Google (YouTube), Facebook, and Twitter illegally using their monopoly powers to restrain public discourse from the rightwing news outlets [*22] you have a duty to your community to speak out or donate your time to walk neighborhoods for your local candidates to help foster a prosperous future for your progeny.
What if you legitimately can't speak? If you have disposable income (and most of us have frivolous expenses we can cut out of our lives), don't blow your budget on the directly political realm (i.e. donating to candidates). Support literature on the right from publishers like Castalia House and Arkhaven. Donate to legal rights groups on our side (e.g., Pacific Legal Foundation, Institute for Justice, and Judicial Watch) and undercover journalists like Project Veritas, exposing government and media corruption. Get books from or donate to various right-wing thinkers challenging the left's academic strangle-hold on political philosophy. The individualist might scoff at donating his hard-earned money to someone else who is doing indirect work but think nothing of wasting money with a company antithetical to our values on a trite frivolity (e.g., a $5 cup of coffee at Starbucks). Put your philosophy on spending in the right context.
The key to overcoming oppressive Foucauldian power capillaries is not merely to resist their flow, but to build our polity of resistance. The left's foundational beliefs are some iteration of communism (be it democratic or dictatorial, when property rights are not foundational but a state privilege, they don't exist), which has always been a global goal (be it communism via Plato's aspirations for a global empire or Marx's workers' party as a purported destiny of global control). Thus, power capillaries have large nodes that are increasingly global in scope (e.g., Google's monopoly on information flow and the European Union's transnational property controls). Since we don't believe in globalism but, nationalism, how do we resist large power structures?
Respect for the political sovereignty of nations doesn't mean we can't build our own international polity to support one another. For example, we want Sweden to have independent sovereign control, but those within Sweden who resist the consolidation to a global socialist empire are our brothers and sisters in the counter-revolution. There is a global polity of the right, one respecting the individual nations along with their sovereignty, and we should let each other know of our support for one another.
After reading this, ask yourself. What will you do? Aristotle taught us that virtue is not an act but a habit. What changes will you make to your life on a day-to-day or week-to-week basis that will assist in our political and cultural aims toward human flourishing?
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[*1] https://monoskop.org/images/5/5d/Foucault_Michel_Power_Knowledge_Selected_Interviews_and_Other_Writings_1972-1977.pdf
[*2] "Heightened activity in the dorsal ACC [anterior cingulate cortex of the brain] was found when participants were either implicitly or explicitly excluded, relative to the inclusion condition. These researchers also found increased activation in the right ventral prefrontal cortex [of the brain], a site associated with negative affect regulation, during explicit (though not implicit) [social] exclusion. Eisenberger et al. (2003) described these reactions to social exclusion as 'a pattern of activations very similar to those found in studies of physical pain' (p. 291)."At Page 210. http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/download?doi=10.1.1.335.4272&rep=rep1&type=pdf
[*3]https://www.researchgate.net/publication/268800545_Cognitive_dissonance_induction_in_everyday_life_An_fMRI_study
[*4] http://thehill.com/homenews/311047-poll-dems-more-likely-to-unfriend-people-due-to-political-posts Further, "57% of those who identify as Republicans say a lot of their close friends are also Republicans, while another 21% say some of them are. An even larger share of Democrats (67%) say a lot of their close friends are Democrats; an additional 18% say some of their close friends are members of their own party. By contrast, far fewer partisans say they have friends in the opposing party. About four-in-ten Republicans (39%) say they have a lot or some friends who are Democrats; most Republicans (55%) say just a few or none of their friends are Democrats. Even fewer Democrats (31%) have at least some friends who are Republicans. About two-thirds of Democrats (64%) have just a few or no Republican friends." http://www.people-press.org/2017/10/05/8-partisan-animosity-personal-politics-views-of-trump/
[*5] https://www.forbes.com/sites/tarunwadhwa/2013/12/23/justine-sacco-internet-justice-and-the-dangers-of-a-righteous-mob/#38a4882a66ab
[*6] http://human-stupidity.com/equality4/race-equality4/james-watson-ruined-for-telling-truth-about-race-sells-nobel-prize-medal
[*7] https://econjwatch.org/file_download/944/LangbertQuainKleinSept2016.pdf?mimetype=pdf
[*8] Credit to Kevin Ryan of Unbiased America for analysis as well. http://www.people-press.org/2017/10/05/the-partisan-divide-on-political-values-grows-even-wider/
[*9] Commentary by Stephen Hicks: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KbA9ALOrHaA
[*10] https://www.wnd.com/2002/03/13093/
[*11] https://www.academia.org/self-identifying-marxist-professors-outnumber-conservatives-as-college-professors/
[*12] https://econjwatch.org/file_download/944/LangbertQuainKleinSept2016.pdf?mimetype=pdf
[*13] http://freebeacon.com/culture/study-political-orientation-most-common-cause-of-discrimination-at-u-of-michigan/
[*14] https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2012/aug/1/liberal-majority-on-campus-yes-were-biased/
[*15] https://shorensteincenter.org/news-coverage-donald-trumps-first-100-days/
[*16] https://econjwatch.org/file_download/944/LangbertQuainKleinSept2016.pdf?mimetype=pdf
[*17] http://stratagemsoftheright.blogspot.com/2017/05/hollywood-narrative-entertainment.html
[*18] Credit to Kevin Ryan of Unbiased America for analysis as well. http://www.people-press.org/2017/10/05/the-partisan-divide-on-political-values-grows-even-wider/
[*19] https://infogalactic.com/info/Mass_killings_under_Communist_regimes
[*20] James O'Keefe. American Pravda. (2018). Page 205.
[*21] http://www.people-press.org/2015/04/07/a-deep-dive-into-party-affiliation/
[*22] http://stratagemsoftheright.blogspot.com/2017/08/the-ire-and-corruption-of-social.html
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